I think Duffy emphasized strength and CONDITIONING. The only team he had with size was the '92 team. Other than that year he was lucky to have 5 kids that weighed more than 200 pounds on the roster.

You are right. My point was the speed was still available. They were always strong.

Not to mention "other" reasons.

I don't want anyone to think I meant politics with that post, that's not where I was going with that. Looking back at it, I can see where it would look that way. Sorry if it offended anyone.

I agree. I am really not trying to discredit the coaches. I just think Ft. Thomas has a special kind of kid willing to do anything. If the coaches focus was on strength and size. The players would be big and strong. The focus is now on speed and quickness so the kids are fast and quick. Duffy focused on size and strength and the speed was still there with Grimm, Galichio(SP), Scarlotto among many, many others. I just think the kids in Ft. Thomas are naturally fast based on a lot of factors other than the weight program.

 

 

Your mention of Duffy shows beyond all doubt that the kids in Ft. Thomas will NOT do anything-his roster was down to high 20's and low 30's!!!

Your mention of Duffy shows beyond all doubt that the kids in Ft. Thomas will NOT do anything-his roster was down to high 20's and low 30's!!!

Unless I misunderstand your post, you are mistaken. Duffy cut players and only kept a few of the very best. That's why the roster was so small. No other coach has done this, and with good reason.

If a coach doesn't use every resource available, then he is not maximizing the potential of his athletes. To make excuses is to settle for less than one's best.

 

One point I'm getting at is no one in Ft. Thomas has ever cried about the unfair advantage private schools have or the unfair advantage the bigger schools have. They just flat out work harder than anyone and take advantage of the talents of their players by implementing a system that works best for them.

 

Once Summer comes, they'll put in more productive hours than anyone in the state. It is more than just Spring Practice.

Unless I misunderstand your post, you are mistaken. Duffy cut players and only kept a few of the very best. No other coach has done this, and with good reason.

 

I don't agree with his philosophy in any way shape or form, but in actuality he made conditions so that they cut themselves. No one in Ft. Thomas would have allowed him to cut players.

 

I believe we mean the same thing, just a different way to phrase it.

I don't agree with his philosophy in any way shape or form, but in actuality he made conditions so that they cut themselves. No one in Ft. Thomas would have allowed him to cut players.

 

I believe we mean the same thing, just a different way to phrase it.

The way I understood it, he did make the cuts. I couldn't say for sure though. But that's the way I thought it was.

Everybody does have a genetic limit to how fast they can run,even with

all the training in the world Carl Lewis would never run a 8 second 100 meters.

I would consider him fast but with the training he did he get faster.

But he also would not reached his full potential if he did not train properly.

 

So if the proper training and hard work is put forth the players will get faster

obviously there is a limit to how fast they can be.If HHS as a team works

and trains for speed and agility then as a team they will get faster and

quicker especially compared to teams that dont.

 

For teams that to a lot of weightlifting to get stronger and bigger

--you cannot get bigger or stronger the size and strength you are born

with can only be maximized--thanks high school and college health science

classes.j/k:banana:

 

Some are separating strength and speed as if they are mutually exclusive; with strength(AND FLEXIBILITY) will also come speed!

The way I understood it, he did make the cuts. I couldn't say for sure though. But that's the way I thought it was.

 

The way I heard it was a player had to run a certain distance in a certain time; if he couldn't do it, then he couldn't play(unless you were a talented 300 lb. linemen that would never be able to make the time on your best day). Those talented ones were allowed to still play.

The way I understood it, he did make the cuts. I couldn't say for sure though. But that's the way I thought it was.

 

BF, he didn't cut a player ever, to the best of my knowledge and I was close to the program and Duffy at the time and had a nephew play for Duffy. The myth that he cut players was fabricated by people who did not like Tom, and there were a lot of those people. Tom was definitely not a "people person".

BF, he didn't cut a player ever, to the best of my knowledge and I was close to the program and Duffy at the time and had a nephew play for Duffy. The myth that he cut players was fabricated by people who did not like Tom, and there were a lot of those people. Tom was definitely not a "people person".

As Mr. Reality said, it wasn't exactly a myth. There are lots of ways to chop down the numbers to just the few you want to play. That was his policy at Danville as it was here. Trust me, nobody had to fabricate anything about those days. :lol:

Back to the Spring game....

 

Did any team in the state have a game to rival the Birds' Spring game????

Ft. Thomas snob.

 

QUOTE]

 

Bit redundant, no?

Glad to meet you also. Perhaps I am not making myself clear. I realize that genetics has alot to do with speed. But to suggest that the genetic pool in Ft. Thomas is superior speed wise, compared to the rest of N. Ky or all of Ky, is a bit of a stretch don't you think? Good lordy, if I posted what quickslick posted about the speed gene pool in Ft. Thomas being superior to other communities, I'd have been torn apart for being an arrogant Ft. Thomas snob.

 

What I've been trying to say is that Dale, more than a lot of coaches, puts more of an emphasis on quickness and speed because of the style of play he prefers. That attracts more of the quick and fast kids to the program. Which makes the team comprised of more fast and quick players. Furthermore, his conditioning program is focused on improving speed and quickness. And speed can be improved. When's the last time you saw Highlands starting offensive or defensive linemen with big food guts? If they can't move, they aren't on the field. And by losing 30 pounds of fat, you'll be faster and quicker and have better endurance. And I'm sorry but a big player not carrying an extra 30-40 pounds of fat in almost all circumstances will be faster than he was when he was carrying 30-40 pounds of fat.

 

Now if all of Highlands players are in really good shape, don't carry around a bunch of extra fat, train for speed and quickness, utilize offensive and defensive systems designed to emphasize speed and the program is attractive to fast, quick players, then the overall team speed is going to be better than programs that don't emphasize those same things. Which was the point I was making in response to quickslick's original point that Dale was blessed with kids with speed and that speed can't be coached. The gene pool in Ft. Thomas is not different than other communities right down the road and speed can be improved and utilized better by coaching techniques in my opinion.

 

Conversely, while the Birds generally are more quicker and faster than most of their opponents, they are also generally much smaller. Watch the Colerain, DeSales and St. X games. Speed didn't beat us, their size and strength did. Admittedly, Colerain had both, but in reviewing the game tape, we weren't a whole lot slower than they were (don't get me wrong, we were slower, and at some positions we were a lot slower), but they were much, much bigger than we were. So Dale's emphasis on speed and quickness comes with a trade off, that at times can be exploited, particularly by big physical, well disciplined football teams.

 

Some coaches emphasize strength and their players look like bulls. Some coaches emphasize speed and their players look like gazelles. Sure it would be great to have really big players that are really fast, but how many Micah Johnsons are out there?

 

I agree w/ most of your post. He has sacraficed size for speed, almost everywhere on the field. Highlands isn't blessed w/ an exceptional number of fast kids. What Mueller has done is taken risks and placed smallish players at postitions and trusted that speed would kill size. You can always make a fast player bigger, it's much more difficult to make a bigger player fast. Where most coaches see a cookie cutter shape and put big kids on the line, Mueller bought into the Jimmy Johnson philosophy of putting speed everywhere, trusting in his off-season regimen to make his players physically ready for their new positions. That has definitely influenced NewCath. They have moved toward playing their best athletes, and relying on their coaches to teach technique to overcome lack of size. I commend Mueller for that. His in game adjustments...well that's another thread.

As an Ashland fan I've enjoyed following this threads discussion of speed, size, nutrition, etc. I'm a pretty big guy who conversely usually always had the smaller quicker youth football teams that won. (NOT bragging b/c good players make good coaches)

 

I believe in large part it's a trickle down effect from the influence of the college games explosion on an emphasis of speed. Anecdotaly(sp?) I'll use Miami & Florida State as a point of reference. Nebraska (rightly considered the strongest team around) got whipped by the speed from Florida and things changed. It wasn't just some receivers & DB's, now even the Big 10/11 conference pines for lightening quick Def Tackles.

 

The approach to the game is completely different IMO and I think the rise in popularity and quality of KY HS football & it's players is partly due to this also. I think we are seeing the influence of talented coaches who recognize this approach and are completely changing the face of KY HS football (not to be overly dramatic:rolleyes: )

 

Our new coach in Ashland, Leon Hart has made a noticeable change towards speed players at EVERY position. We still have a great strength training program with coach Tony Love, et al. (witness some of the numbers posted in that thread). NO offense to any other coaches but it's much different than the days for example when our TB was made to do squats, etc till he was bulked up & was slower as a senior IMO.

 

Highlands has always had a great program and in todays electronic age the kids in even the smaller less isolated communities are exposed to all the necessary factors to become the best they can be - IF they decide to pursue it :thumb:

 

Cheers, Woody Jr

 

 

 

.... still hating those new OSU jerseys :cry: